No argument can fail to be enhanced by an Orwell quote. That's why he's become the authority of first resort for people who don't know what they're talking about

No-one, ultimately, had a clue about the election. The pollsters, the politicians, the pundits got it wrong. Even the bookies, who are always meant to be right, having a financial interest in being so, were wrong. No-one predicted the result we got or understands it now we’ve got it. Why did people vote this way here, that way there? Why did the Lib Dems lose seats? Who benefits most from a Tory deal? No idea.

Amid all this confusion, spare a thought for the poor political columnists, the people who have to pretend that they can still explain it all in 600 words. What on earth can they write? When a political journalist isn’t sure of their ground, the first rule is to keep things portentous, but vague. Tell the party leaders what they should be doing to make a success of this election. Just don’t say it’s what they will do. The second: when you do come down strongly on someone’s side, refer to a higher authority to give yourself the requisite gravitas. Someone whose authority will not be questioned – someone who radiates an indefinable but unimpeachable cachet. In America, if it’s not God, it’s the Founding Fathers. Over here, it’s Orwell.

Many journalists, moonlighting as clairvoyants, are able to reveal exactly what Orwell would think about any contemporary political question. In the last month alone we’ve learned how Orwell “foresaw our treatment of Sharon Shoesmith” (The Independent), that this election represented “a campaign that Orwell would recognise” (The Indie again), or how Orwell, an old Etonian just like Cameron, wouldn’t mind a bit of fagging (The Daily Telegraph).

Crudely put, George Orwell is anyone’s bitch. Whatever the topic, whatever the political position, he can be wheeled out in support to enunciate universal truths in a voice as compelling as the ghost in Hamlet. From voting reform to CCTV, from Trident to the debates, there’s a perfect Orwell quotation, apposite, terse and oracular, just waiting to be plucked out and flourished. I know because I’ve done it myself – writing about media interest in the death of a young British girl overseas, I used a handy line from “The Decline of the English Murder” to bolster my argument. If Saint George is with me, I need fear no controversy.

But why Orwell? Why not Dickens, George Bernard Shaw or some other safely dead and highly moral writer? Perhaps vanity has something to do with it: unlike other canonical writers, Orwell was a working hack. Take the “As I Please” essays he did for Tribune, where he talks about everything from immigration to comic books – he was no proud literary lion, but a typewriter for hire. He too would roll up his sleeves and scribble for money. Perhaps the struggling journalist invokes the saint with a faint, wistful hope that he too will be as useful to his scribbling descendants in a couple of generations.

Chiefly, though, Orwell’s ambiguity makes him useful. Most of the columns on our 2010 general election are loaded with so much instantly outdated minutiae that within six months they will only be of interest to historians. In a generation only the most diligent academic will remember the newly unelected Charles Clarke, but his every up and down can be chartered in the political columns of the last decade. Orwell rarely spent his words on the details of the day – instead, he used them as springboards to boost him into the territory of the universal.

That’s what makes him so useful: he suits many writers on many occasions. Those suspicious of political motives for the conflict in Iraq may quote: “War against a foreign country only happens when the moneyed classes think they are going to profit from it.” A hawk might then defend the tactics of the same war thus: “To survive it is often necessary to fight, and to fight you have to dirty yourself.”

Like Jefferson’s writing, like Franklin’s, like the Bible, there’s a line in there to suit every side of every argument, and they all come from sources whose authority may not be questioned. The contrary Irwin, in Alan Bennett’s History Boys, recognises this when he suggests A-level students could argue that a modern Orwell would be a member of the National Front.

Of course, the real Orwell, whom I am delighted to be able to reveal exclusively to you, would have had no truck with all this beatification of himself or his prose. After all, it was he who said “Sainthood is a thing that human beings must avoid.” And who can argue with Orwell?

Comments

An American

May 10, 2010 at 17:33

Maybe your journos trot out Orwell so much because you Brits and your socialized NHS and CCTVs everywhere are already so close to the Orwellian dystopia. Just have to privilege some ridiculous standardized language to be exactly there...oh wait, you've already got "The Queen's English". Run for your lives!

An English

May 11, 2010 at 14:56

I take it the American commenter is being ironic, if they know what that means? Read the article again and think about what you have just written. And although you are very right about the cctv situation in the UK, your own paltry healthcare system, which condemns many of your uninsured to an early death, leaves you in no position to comment on ours. Orwells 1984 examined how true meaning can be perveretd by the distilling and bastardisation of language, which standard english seeks to avoid. It's the worldwide, banal, American English, aided by the internet, which best imitates newspeak.

JohnBax

May 13, 2010 at 11:46

Great little piece, Alastair. I have nothing against GO, he had a truly captivating prose-style, but he was too unsystematic a thinker to take us very far in understanding the world, and pinning down what he actually thought about anything is always a bit of a puzzle. But the accepted line is that he was a saint, and God help anyone who breaks ranks on this. What always perplexes me is that everyone talks about his 'courage'. Granted, it was courageous to fight in Spain, but that's not usually what they're talking about: they're usually referring to Animal Farm and 1984. But writing these books did not require courage in 20C Britain, and being turned down by one's publisher is not, I'm sorry to say, an uncommon experience, or some kind of martyrdom equivalent to the Gulag - especially when like GO you find another one soon enough. The sainthood of Orwell, as you suggest, blots out many other worthwhile 20C writers: J B Priestley's reputation, for example, has been virtually eliminated by Orwell-worship. I'm sure GO wouldn't have wanted this: he was a good guy and a good writer, and wouldn't have claimed to be anything else.

David M

May 17, 2010 at 23:12

The same idea occurred to me after reading one too many pieces invoking Orwell as the authority on anything. I went a little further in my blog post, going so far as to suggest that it's bordering on a personality cult.

George Orwell Books

May 18, 2010 at 02:47

Interesting perspective in the article. I would say that part of the reason so many people like to use Orwell is that he had a lot of great quotes! I am a bit biased though because he's one of my favorite authors.

Chris

May 21, 2010 at 09:45

No one predicted the election?
I thought everyone knew the tories weren't strong enough to win it by themselves and that's why there was so much focus on Clegg to the point that he was asked who he would consult first in the event of a hung parliament.
The fact of the matter is that commentators are simply that, not interested in analysing news properly but pinning anything that isn't completely normal and expected or comfortable on Orwell. That is lazy journalism and this article goes a step further to make an article about why this is so!
Ever decreasing circles methinks...

KIMBLE_PERRY

I. Ward

Kahl

August 13, 2010 at 15:28

Orwell like any artist or person of real substance was a complex figure. He was an Atheist but wanted to be buried in the Anglican rite; he was a socialist but desired to have his son educated at elite posh schools. To expect something simply out of an Artist is a foolish thought. Your right people invoke his name so much it becomes a cliche, however don't underestimate his pragmatism and literary skill. If you need help, ask yourself: Are you perfectly aligned and clear in each and everything you put your mind and name to? if so either your mad, dumb or God. If not then your just like the rest of us: human. The notion that there is an absolute right and an absolute wrong is naive and childish. The ambiguity of Orwell is what makes him so great.

Sponsored features

Prospect has established itself as a must-read title with key figures in government, journalism, policy making and business. People turn to Prospect for the ideas and trends behind the headlines and for a contrarian view of topics.